What is the Difference Between Magento 1 & 2?

Ten years after Magento 1 was released, Magento 2 is eclipsing its predecessor. The platform represents a big step up from the initial version, addressing security issues and providing greater speed and performance. If you currently have Magento 1 in place, it is definitely the time to look into Magento 2 migration. To help you understand why this is important, read on to discover more about the key differences between Magento 1 and 2.

An overview of the changes to Magento

Before we go into detail regarding the differences between Magento 1 and 2, here is a quick snapshot of what has been changed…

Connect Store -> New “Marketplace”

“Wild West” Extension Market -> Rigorous Extension Testing

Popular Payment & Shipping Methods -> Same Payment & Shipping Methods

Legacy Checkout -> Streamlined Checkout Process

5-12 Month Project Cycle -> Claimed 4-8 Month Project Cycle

EE Pricing by License –> EE Pricing by Order Volume

Admin Non-Responsive -> Responsive Admin Panel

No Data Grid -> Customisable Data Grid For Catalog

Stale Admin Panel (Backoffice) – Fresh New Design in Admin

JS – Prototype -> JS Jquery

Decent Automated Tests –> Better Automated Tests

Severe DB Locking Issues -> Zero Table Locking (Checkout)

Full Page Cache (EE) -> FPC (EE)/Varnish

Minimal Video Features -> Integrated Video (PDP)*

Secure Bridge -> PCI Compliance Hosted Fields

Eternal PayPal -> In-site PayPal Experience

Sub-Par Search (SOLR) –> Elastic Search (EE)

Weak Content Staging -> Advanced Content Staging

RWD Theme Included -> RWD Theme Included

No Support For HTML5/CSS3 -> Native Support HTML5/CSS3

Legacy PHP -> PHP5.6+ / 7.0

No Front-end Library -> Ships With LESS

Open Source (CE) -> Open Source (CE)

Flexible Architecture -> New Architecture For Speed

API Added Retroactively -> API Is Core To The Technology

SEO and security

So, let’s begin by taking a look at the SEO and security improvements that you can expect with Magento 2. We have grouped these two elements for a reason. The SEO enhancements have resulted in improvements in terms of security. For instance, with the catalog pages, there are now rich snippets that enhance search results in SERPs. This has caused the hashing algorithms for passwords to get stronger, which in turn, has strengthened passwords for dictionary sorts of attacks. This is just one of many improvements Magento have made with their latest release. If you do not upgrade your software now, you could be leaving your business vulnerable to an attack.

Dashboard

One element of Magento 2 that you are assured to be a fan of no matter the nature of your business is the new dashboard. The admin panel has been updated, creating a much more intuitive and user-friendly experience. You will be able to find information with ease, as well as navigating to all parts of the admin panel without needing to think about. Not only this, but the management of your store is much more efficient too. If that was not enough, Magento also presents a comprehensive dashboard, which is equipped with a lot of great features and insights. You will be able to see the likes of shipping and quantity, bestsellers and customers, revenue tax, top search terms, average orders, last orders, and lifetime sales, enabling you to monitor the current state of your company.

Extensions

While there are a good number of third-party extensions available with the first version of Magento, the issue is that there are extension conflicts when two or more extensions attempt to rewrite the same functionality. The problem can only be resolved manually, which, of course, requires effort and takes a lot of time. This is something that you do not need to be worried about with Magento 2. This is because the platform enables code to overlap core code, as opposed to overriding it. If that was not enough, you could save money too. This is because it is a lot cheaper to install and update new extensions with Magento 2. The process is easier too because of the new technology that has been introduced in Magento 2, including Require.js, CSS3, and HTML5.

Speed and performance

Another compelling reason why you should make the switch to Magento 2 is that there is a significant difference in terms of speed and performance. When compared with the initial version, Magento 2 delivers much faster page load speeds. This is due to the full-caching that Magento has provided, which is available in both the Enterprise and Community additions. This is important because even a 100-millisecond delay in your page load times can cause your bounce rate to increase by seven percent. (Source: Unbounce)

Architectural differences

Last but not least, there are a number of architectural differences when you compare Magento 1 and Magento 2. The main issue with the initial version was the performance of the store. Because of this, the team at Magento have significantly changed the stack by adding a number of different technologies. This includes the likes of Nginx 1.7, Symfony, Composer, and Apache. This has led to a variety of notable differences within the architecture of the program, including better browser caching for static content, as well as a reduction in terms of unneeded browser operations. This has been achieved due to minimizing and bundling JavaScript. If that was not enough, the latest PHP versions are also supported with Magento 2. These versions incorporate security enhancements, which have had a positive impact on the store’s speed.

As you can see, there are a number of significant differences between Magento 1 and Magento 2, and so it is not hard to comprehend why it is pivotal that you make the move to the latter sooner rather than later. This is something that we can help you to do at Newbird Design. We have years of experience in the industry and we have helped many businesses to make the switch to Magento 2. Please do not hesitate to give us a call for more information.